Dear President Obama

Editor: Your State of the Union speech last week laudably
referenced clean tech and renewable energy several times. We ask
that you follow your words with action, by leading the transition
to a post-carbon economy and a healthier world.
You also spoke of our need to face hard truths.
Hard truth: Our continued, willful reliance on fossil fuels is
making our planet uninhabitable. We are evicting ourselves from the
only paradise we’ve ever known.
Hard truth: No combination of current and anticipated renewable
sources can maintain our profligate energy usage as the global
supply of fossil fuels heads for terminal decline.
For the recently released Searching for a Miracle, Post Carbon
Institute Senior Fellow Richard Heinberg conducted a “net energy”
analysis of 18 different energy sources (including nuclear and
“clean coal”). He concluded that the amount of energy available
after accounting for the energy used in extraction and production
of those sources is — at our current and anticipated rates of
consumption — insufficient to get us “over the hump” to a
post-carbon world.
Our 29 Post Carbon Institute Fellows — experts in the leading
economic, energy, and environmental issues of the day — all agree
that this “net energy” deficit is just one of many interrelated
crises shaping the 21st century.
Each crisis alone creates formidable challenges; in combination,
their complexity admits no simple solution. But given their
direness, inaction risks tragedy.
Mr. President, we respect you and your advisors and appreciate
the enormity of the dilemmas you and all of us confront. When a
great leader frames a great challenge, a resilient people will rise
to meet the opportunity. And so we ask, Mr. President, that you
tell the American people that we must:
1. Face reality. In a carbon-constrained world, true prosperity
comes not from heedless growth, but from shared security,
community, and liberty.
2. Prepare for the future. Conservation, with an emphasis on
building a green economy and revitalizing struggling communities,
offers cost-effective “found” energy, and the most immediate and
long-term return on investment.
3. Lead the way. A substantial investment in renewable energy,
with an emphasis on distributed solar and wind, offers the best
hope for moving to a sustainable economy and environment.
Mr. President, lead us in creating a future worth inheriting.
Post Carbon Institute and our Fellows will support you and your
team in whatever capacity we can. We believe that the American
people, and the world’s people, will support you as well.
Ashley Miller
Post Carbon Institute